Incandescent
by Year of the dog
Summary: She wishes he won't look at anyone but her. Only because she can no longer look at anything but him.


_I know, I know. I really shouldn't be writing these little ficlets since I've still got other stuff I really need to work on. But I was writing prose for something, and got inspired really quickly. From there it took off. I've written something kind of like this from Ryouji's perspective, so I also thought it was about time I did something for Femmie. This is certainly one of the darker takes I've had on their relationship, and definitely the first time I've done FeMC specifically in such a dark light. So honestly, I'm just hoping I portrayed her how I was intending to. It was a challenge to myself that I really wanted to do though, so here it is. I hope you guys all enjoy._

_P.S. As a note, for I know someone will make a comment about it, I know that you can summon Thanatos after Pharos leaves. That technically you're not supposed to be able to summon him until that whole ordeal is over. But when you think about, it does make sense that she wouldn't be able to. I mean, Ryouji/Pharos __**is**__ Thanatos, so her losing one does seems sensible with losing the other._

Disclaimer: Nope, still don't own it. Still really only own about seven bucks in which to try.

**Incandescent**

She puts the gun to her head, expression blank and easy. This action no longer requires thought. It is so practiced, so natural, that it has long ago become simple muscle memory. Riichi whispers the name, pulls the trigger.

And nothing happens.

She doesn't move, doesn't even blink. The shadow advances, attacks, is fended off by Akihiko. She doesn't budge, even after he angrily rounds on her.

Despite the fact that there is not a scratch on her, she is broken. Because now she can no longer ignore the gaping, raw hole that is gnawing in the pit of her stomach. There is no way to deny the emptiness she feels, the loneliness that claws at her heart. She falls to her knees, and barely recognizes that the cold wet feeling dripping down her cheeks are her tears.

She wants so badly to cry for the one very important thing she has lost. The one thing she knows she will never be able to regain. Her favorite Persona; her other half.

"Thana…tos…"

oOo

She is dead to the world. Everything that happens around her is choked in a numb haze and she can barely register what is right before her eyes. Days are monotonous, hours take forever. Everything that comes out of people's mouths is such a syrupy blend that she can't make out anything. She's not sure she really has it in her to want to.

All of her energy goes into waking up. To eating enough to keep from starving. To making her way down the stairs and boarding the train and getting to school. To taking the trip back. To dealing with the nightmares that come every night; every gasping moment. To keeping back the nausea that accompanies the hole in her stomach that keeps growing, and growing, and just won't stop.

The emptiness is far worse than any of her nightmares. Even if those nightmares typically center around her being left all alone and abandoned by someone who she has felt by her side for as long as she can remember.

Riichi feels as if she is a windup toy that has lost their key. She feels like a marionette whose strings have been cut, and is stolen away from her puppeteer. Soon she doesn't even have the energy to feel this.

oOo

Everything comes back in a flash. Red eyes meet pale sky blue, and they lock together in surprise. She feels strangely energetic, and her senses rush back to her so fast that it leaves her dizzy. Life is no longer up in the clouds; no longer seen in a hazy, dreamlike existence. She can hear people. Their whispers of excitement, their shouts and jokes and general foolishness, the tapping and shuffling of limbs against floor and desks. She swears she can hear him breathing. The rise and fall of his chest, the hollow sound of air rushing through his lungs.

It's so invigorating that she barely realizes the most important thing of all. The gnawing, growing, _greedy_ hole in her stomach is now gone. Vanished just as quickly as it had come to her. Her emptiness is no more, loneliness has flown out the window as if it had never existed in the first place. But she's so enraptured that this doesn't matter.

"My name is Ryouji Mochizuki,"

And her whole world opens back up.

oOo

Riichi has never felt so jealous. She wishes he would look only at her. Gaze at her alone with those eyes full of life. Only because she can no longer look at anything but him. His every smile, every flirting gesture, every date he goes on, everything of his directed at other girls both irritates and leaves her full of longing. It makes her wonder why it can't be her, and simultaneously wonder why she so desperately wants it to be.

Ryouji invades her every thought. She finds herself unable to concentrate, focused solely on the warmth and desire that is the raven haired Casanova. She dreams of him, waking with images of blue eyes, radiant smiles, and the sickly sweet stench of death that she can never shake from her imaginings. Soon she finds she can't escape him, and even her room brings thoughts and images that should have nothing to do with him. Memories of a little, smiling boy that she's unsure relate at all. But these calm her, and thinking of them wraps her in a blanket of such soothing nostalgia that she forgets to wonder and worry about things that cannot possibly be.

She wants nothing more than for him to possess her. She wants to be a toy; an object; a possession that only he is allowed to coddle and play with. Her obsession, her _need_ overwhelms her, and she grows afraid of just how much her desire can extend. But this strangely intrigues her. Because she has never wanted something this much. Because she has never been so possessive.

oOo

He brushes her elbow and she jolts at the sensation. A thousand tiny sparks flare up from his touch. The feeling of lingering emptiness (of loneliness) retreats like shadows from the sun, and she can't help but want more, more, _more!_ of him. She wants him to wrap her in his arms and never think of letting go. Oh God if he could burn her like this forever she would never regret a thing. She vaguely notices him tense and his grip tighten, and she wonders if maybe he's thinking the same thing. If maybe he wants to dominate her as much as she wants him to. She feels her arm reach up to stroke his face, and silently relishes in how accepting (how _wanting_) he looks. The moment is broken by their classmates voices, and Riichi is surprised at just how furious, how feral the look is that briefly flashes across Ryouji's features. Like Death who is told he isn't allowed his precious possession, flutters through her mind though she's unsure of why or really what that has to do with the boy who shines like the sun.

oOo

He is hers. It is like a little voice whispering at the back of her mind. She owns him, it is a simple and absolute fact, and no matter how many of those other girls coo and titter around him, he will never be theirs. Because everything of his belongs to her. But she has no proof, other than this voice that she is beginning to think is her imagination making excuses for her. And yet, it is so familiar, so real that she sometimes wonders if maybe it really is there. Like maybe that little boy in the striped pajamas who left her all alone really hadn't disappeared. Like he had hidden himself in the back of her skull and was now merely telling her the truths of this world.

But that cannot be, because this voice is so faint, so unlike how he communicated with her before, that it is undeniable he is gone. She need only to remember how she can no longer feel Thanatos burning inside her. This opens the hole a tiny bit, and Riichi is dizzy and nauseous until she thinks once more of Ryouji.

oOo

"I'll probably make you sad,"

No. How could that be when he had given her the world back? He was her everything, and no matter how much he told her he wasn't worth it, she could never let him go. To let him slip through her fingers would be like covering the sun in a blanket and refusing to look at it again. _He_ was her world.

And yet, there's a strange feeling in her gut that she's not really the one who's holding onto anything. No matter how much he professes he's hers, she can't shake the feeling that it's really the other way around, and she is the one who is clutched in his grasp. But whatever the case, they've been tied together. There is no ignoring, no _denying _that. Every touch, every brushing gesture is a reminder of how strong their bond (or maybe it was really a chain.) is. They meld together perfectly, as if they are one in the same and can never be torn apart because to do so would be to kill them.

But she pains him. She brings him anxiety and hurt and no matter how much love she gives him it only grows worse. Riichi is selfish, and that is why she cannot let him go. Because while she hurts him, she cannot bear to think about how much it will hurt to leave him. To never grasp him again.

Then she remembers that he's just as possessive as she is. His every word, every action, every thought is simply in order to make her his. He has told her this, and admitted that he doesn't understand why he feels such a desire to chain her to him. Admits that it sickens him, frightens him, and that he understands if she wants to run.

She only smiles and soothes his worries. For she realizes that he knows there is no way for either of them to release their hold on the other. And though this should worry her, she only finds solace in the knowledge that she won't lose him.

oOo

She moans into his collar, hands clutching _tighter, tighter_. Her nails dig crescent moons into the skin of his shoulders, and he doesn't seem to notice at all. He's too busy trying to breath. Every thrust brings them closer; ensures that they really are one. She can't hold it anymore, and lets out a delicate gasp that he silences with his mouth.

These are the times her emptiness completely fades, and she can tell that he no longer feels pain. Because they are too busy being in love. They are too busy drowning in each other's warmth and touch and embrace.

But when it's over, everything returns to normal and she has yet again to wonder about the feeling of dread that is now cementing itself in her stomach. The feeling that he will disappear from her, just as that one part of her was stolen away the day she could no longer summon her harbinger of death. He smiles, and ensures her that she's his everything. That no matter what could have happened, no matter what will happen, there is, will be, _could_ be, only her. She can't imagine how it's possible for her to be as much of his world as he is hers.

And he silences all her thoughts with his one endearment.

"My dearest."

oOo

Everything is broken.

Once again her everything (_her very core_) is stolen away from her. Ryouji disappears, and she is given a harsh reminder of the day he last left her. The hole is once more torn, and she spends the next four hours locked in the bathroom.

Riichi emerges with swollen eyes and a false smile that everyone tells is forced. She's tired, oh so tired, and though she doesn't relapse like she did back then, it's still noticeable how much a toll this has taken on her.

She returns to her room, and wonders how many more times must she lose her sun.

oOo

He asks her to kill him, and she wants nothing more than to do just that. Not because she wants what he desires for her, but because she's so furious at him for suggesting it.

His expression when she turns him down makes up for it.

So does the words she had never before heard him say.

oOo

There is a part of him in that giant towering mess of a god. It is not him, but he is somewhere in it. It doesn't have to hold his face, his hair, or remnants of his voice for her to know this. Perhaps it is because he was inside of her for so many years, but she can feel him. She can also feel how disgusted he is with himself, and this makes her only that much more determined. She wants to free him, because his hurt is now suffocating her, and the fact that she can really do nothing for him is scorching her from the inside out. Unlike his touch, this flame is one that licks and burns painfully and not pleasantly.

He orders her to come, and she does. She comes again, and again, until her hands are bleeding, fingers slick against the weapon, and her whole body is so rundown that she can feel her ligaments falling apart and tendons rip, tear, snapping. She comes until she is able to fight no more. It is only then when she is granted the ability to seal this, and even then she's not sure she has the energy to.

When it is all over though, she understands what happened. What will happen. And she savors the consequences wondrously, because they are more a blessing then the curse the raven haired god of death is making it out to be.

oOo

She doesn't remember his face, but she dreams of it. She doesn't recognize his name, but she doodles it on every notebook she owns, on every paper she happens to touch. There is no memory of smiles, of blue eyes, or suspenders, but she finds herself doing double takes whenever something yellow catches her eye, or someone mentions radiance. She cannot place any of his words, anything that ever escaped his mouth, but she finds herself whispering 'Dearest' to herself over, and over, and over. Until it is so raw in her ears that she bites her knuckles in order to make it stop.

She can't remember anything, and yet instinctively knows _every_thing.

The dorm mates she can vaguely remember, aren't as strong as this one boy who she knows she knows, but cannot for the life of her understand why. This 'Ryouji', this 'Pharos', this '_Sun'_ who invades her every thought, has never before been seen by her. But she holds him close to her heart, so close that she occasionally wonders if it's possible to love someone this much without even knowing them. It's strange, and yet she can see no reason for it to be. Because he's everything, she tells herself. Because she belongs to him.

She isn't empty, as she recalls she once was, but she is lonely. No amount of friends can alleviate this emotion, though she doesn't understand why. Her happiness only truly comes when she catches glimpses of a boy who has never really been there.

And yet, there's a small part of her that eagerly anticipates graduation day. She's unsure why, since there's nothing special for her in particular, but the giddy feeling bubbles up and almost overflows every time it's mentioned. She marks it on her calendar in bright pink pen, and traces the circle every night before she goes to bed.

oOo

It comes back in bits and pieces. For three days the memories flood and trickle, drip and drown her in their vast enormity. Riichi realizes that no one else is remembering. Except for perhaps the android-turned-human, she is alone in her memories.

This both scares her, and fills her with relief. If she's the only one who remembers, she's the only one who will think her so utterly selfish for being happy about what is about to happen. But soon they start to comment, and she realizes that she will have to leave them confused and disoriented, and without a leader. Even this is not enough to make her regret. Even this is not nearly enough to make her stray from her desire to once more be together with him. With the one who's known as 'Death' by everyone else, and only looks like joy to her.

oOo

Everything is white. Utterly and nauseatingly white.

Riichi lifts her arms, and gropes desperately for something that isn't so bland, so _lifeless. _She bites her lip, moans helplessly into the nothingness. This wasn't what she was promised. She wasn't told that she would be all alone; that she would once more have to live her life with the empty, raw, disgusting void in her stomach that reminds her only of what she no longer had.

And then she feels warmth, and the touch of fingertips feathering up her arm. She can't hold back her smile, and gasps in desperate pleasure when she feels hands cup her face. She can no longer take it, and she leans foreword to meet him halfway. His low chuckle fills her ears, drowning her in warmth that only increases when he envelopes her in arms she hasn't felt for ages, but still remembers perfectly.

"My dearest," he whispers, and their world is painted in perfect watercolor.

She buries her face further into her shoulder, and delights in the fact that there is now nothing to take him away from her. Nothing to rip her away from him.

For he is the sun, and she cannot bear to live without the light.


End file.
